Tomi Lunsford

Like so many other musicians who have made a home in Nashville, singer Tomi Lunsford has spent her life immersed in country music. A native of Asheville, NC, she played in a family band from a young age. Her father, Jim Lunsford, was a journeyman fiddler who played with superstars of classic country and bluegrass such as Roy Acuff, Jim and Jesse McReynolds, Reno and Smiley, Bob Wills, and Marty Robbins. Her great-uncle, Bascom Lamar Lunsford, was a lawyer and famed collector of folk songs from the mountains of North Carolina.

For Tomi Lunsford, these rambling roots in the culture of Appalachia have supported equally impressive branches. Her playful vocal style draws from jazz and the blues. There are traces of Billie Holiday, Betty Carter and Carmen McRae in Lunsford’s voice, as well as Memphis Minnie and Alberta Hunter. She boasts a four-octave range.

In spite of her singular style and impressive pedigree, Lunsford is not yet widely known. She recently released the album Come On Blue, a follow up to her 1997 debut High Ground.

Gwen and the Music Inside Out crew hit the road to visit Tomi Lunsford at her home in Nashville.

A portrait of her father, Jim Lunsford, at Tomi’s home in Nashville.

Connect with Tomi Lunsford

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Bascom Lamar Lunsford

Tomi Lunford’s great-uncle, Bascom Lamar Lunsford, was a classic country gentleman-scholar. He was born in Mars Hill, NC in 1882, and spent much of his life in the town Leicester, NC (pronounced “Lester”), which is now a suburb of Asheville. He was a teacher and a lawyer, but his passion was preserving and promoting the folk traditions of Southern Appalachia… So much so, that the floor of his home was custom-built reportedly, “so you could have a clogging team in the living room.”

Lunsford founded the 1927 Mountain Dance and Folk Festival in Asheville, NC, which provided a prototype for the 1st National Folk Festival in 1936. The Mountain Dance Fest recently celebrated its 90th anniversary.

Though he’d been collecting folk songs for decades, in 1928 Lunsford made a commercial recording of “Jesse James” and “I Wish I Was a Mole in the Ground” for Brunswick Records. In 1952, the latter number appeared on Harry Smith’s seminal “Anthology of American Folk Music,” an album that’s been cited as a major influence by 1960s folk revivalists such as Jerry Garcia and Jim Kweskin.

Tomi Lunsford’s jazz-inflected approach to country music seems novel in modern-day Nashville. But throughout the 20th Century, country and bluegrass musicians across the country have had periodic love affairs with jazz.

As early as the 1930s, Texas swing bands crossed the plains between Dallas and Kansas playing a blend of big band jazz and country. Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys were among the most popular of these ensembles.

Country guitar legend Chet Atkins’ first major band was a jazz combo called the Dixieland Swingers. In 1956, building on his relationship with the country duo Homer Haynes and Jethro Burns, Atkins released a collection of jazz standards called Jazz From the Hills.

A major influence on Atkins, Kentucky picker Merle Travis also drew heavily from jazz technique in developing his signature guitar style.

In 1975, blind Florida fiddler Vassar Clements released his groundbreaking album, Hillbilly Jazz. Joined by folk revivalist and polymath David Bromberg and Elvis Presley drummer DJ Fontana, Clements helped kick off the “new grass” movement, which found traditional artists exploring novel approaches to their craft.

Around the same time, a young ensemble called the New Grass Revival was starting to turn heads and offend die-hard traditionalists with its highly innovative and improvisational approach to string band music. Band members Bela Fleck, Sam Bush, and Curtis Burch have since become synonymous with the style.

If you’re enjoying this music, check out a few more country jazz numbers from across the 20th Century.

Music Inside Out is a weekly radio program that celebrates the music and musicians of Louisiana and explores both their influences and their impact around the world. Host Gwen Thompkins is an enthusiastic believer in great music and you hear that, week after week.

Tune in to Music Inside Out on WWNO 89.9 FM in New Orleans Thursdays at 7:00p and Saturdays at Noon. And you can listen to the shows right here, online, anytime.